"Hellenga is fearlessly inventive. Could anybody else combine snake handling, the Ituri pygmies of the Congo, life in a women's prison, learning to play timpani, a murder trial and a poignant love affair in three hundred-odd fast-paced, highly readable pages?"
—Maxine Kumin

THE SNAKEWOMAN OF LITTLE EGYPT by Robert Hellenga


"The lovers in Hellenga's moving, profound novels do not live in a world of conventional happy endings. His romances often end in attenuated moments of both disappointment and tenderness, partings that have the feel not of failed relationships but of life moving on and working out as it must. There is melancholy in that but a kind of happiness, too.

So it was in his best-selling debut, The Sixteen Pleasures (1994), and so it is in his latest novel, about a young woman, Sunny, just released from prison after serving five years for shooting (but not killing) her husband, and Jackson, an anthropology professor torn between his desire to return to Africa and to settle into the comfortable university life he's found in southern Illinois. Everything changes when Jackson meets Sunny, who grew up in a snake-handling church in Illinois' Little Egypt area (she shot her husband after he forced her to put her hand in a box of rattlesnakes). Sunny rents Jackson's garage apartment and quickly becomes his lover, but she is trying to escape her childhood and her husband, and Jackson is entranced by her stories of the Church of the Burning Bush with Signs Following, eventually going there to do fieldwork.

Hellenga fills the novel not only with fascinating details of snake handling and the religious ecstasy it inspires but also with a beguiling portrait of the comfort and shared intimacy of domestic life. Jackson and Sunny dance between the safe harbor of their life together and the wider sea of courage, risk, and adventure, each teaching the other about the many forms of joie de vivre.Yes, it is a melancholy story, but it is also immensely satisfying and even uplifting in that unique way that only deeply felt life can provide"

.--Ott, Bill Copyright 2010 Booklist

THE OUTSIDE BOY by Jeanine Cummins



"Christy, nearly 12, is an Irish Traveller, a Pavee, a child of motion who, with his family, journeys restlessly from town to town, never staying in any place long enough to call it home. But when his beloved Grandda dies, family secrets begin to spill out, and things begin to change, perhaps irrevocably. Set in Ireland in 1959, Cummin's first novel (shes also the author of the memoir A Rip in Heaven, 2004) is a deeply moving and elegiac look at a vanishing culture. Told in Christy's vernacular but often poetic first-person voice, The Outside Boy is gorgeously written and an implicit celebration of Irish storytelling. And it offers a convincing and evocative look at a way of life little known or understood by the many foreign to it. Though Cummin's treatment of the Pavee may sometimes seem idealized, she is quick to acknowledge their occasional petty thefts and tradition of mooching. Her overriding, beautifully realized theme is larger than that, however: it is the universal desire to find a place where one belongs and people whether ones own family or as-yet-unknown others whose presence provides essential comfort, contentment, and completion.

~ Booklist, copyright 2010, American Library Association

It's that time of year when we're out and about more, life gets a bit rushed and people can be thoughtless and sometimes, just downright rude. Whoopi's book may be just what you need to realize you're not the only one who thinks good manners are a thing of the past.

IS IT JUST ME? OR IS IT NUTS OUT THERE? By Whoopi Goldberg


"Have you noticed that things aren't as civil as they once were? Or that rudeness is no longer an exception but a lifestyle? Sure you have. All you need to do is set foot outside your door to see that bad manners are taking over everywhere. People are yakking on cell phones in restaurants, even at church. Folks in carpools wear enough cologne to make our eyes bleed. Complete strangers think it's OK to rub a pregnant lady's belly. Passengers abuse flight attendants, family outings to the ball park are ruined by rowdy drunks . . . a congressman heckled the President of the United States.

Well, Whoopi Goldberg has noticed all this and more and asked herself, "Is it just me?" Unleashing her trademark irreverence and humor, her new book of observations takes a funny and excruciatingly honest look at how a loss of civility is messing with the quality of life for all of us.

So if your pet peeve is folks who talk in movie theaters like it was their living room, or if you get bugged by people clipping their nails and performing other personal hygiene next to you on the bus, or if you cringe when "please" and "thank you" get replaced by "gimme" and "huh?" . . . you have found a kindred spirit. Because Whoopi has witnessed the growing disrespect and rudeness in our lives and realized she is not alone. And, as you'll discover in these pages, neither are you."

~ from the Publisher

"Salvation City" is not only timely and thought-provoking but also generous in its understanding of human nature. When apocalypse comes, I want Nunez in my lifeboat." -"Vanity Fair"

SALVATION CITY by Sigrid Nunez


"Teenager Cole Vining had just moved with his parents from Chicago to a rural Indiana college town when a deadly flu epidemic leaves him orphaned and memory impaired. Shuffled from a Dickensian orphanage to a conservative Christian couple, Cole finds his muddled memories of his liberal parents clashing with the new reality of life in Salvation City with Pastor Wyatt, a charismatic preacher with a history of substance abuse, and his wife, Tracy. Cole now has a safe, close-knit community around him, but he feels its limitations as Tracy struggles to homeschool him. Then, an unexpected visitor presents Cole with new options and hope for a more balanced future...."

.-Jenn B. Stidham, Houston Community Coll.-Northeast, TX (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc.

BLOOD OF THE PRODIGAL by P. L. Gaus



"Amish bishop Eli Miller of Holmes County, OH, placed a ban on his own 18-year-old son Jonah when he refused to follow Amish precepts. Now, after ten years, Jonah returns to kidnap the son he fathered as a teenager, then disappears again. Not wanting to publicize private problems, Miller asks local professor Mike Branden for help in locating the pair. Branden, in turn, frets about not contacting police, especially after murder muddies the waters. Gaus obviously knows his subject well: a professor at the College of Wooster in the heart of Ohio's Amish region, he provides precise, detailed descriptions of Amish practices and full-bodied, unhurried, well-measured prose."

~ Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc.

THE DINOSAUR HUNTER by Homer Hickam


"Former Los Angeles police detective-turned-Montana cowboy Mike Wire is enjoying the quiet life on the Square C ranch until the arrival of the titular paleontologist. The scientist's zeal impresses the ranch's owner, widow Jeanette Coulter, who allows him to hunt for T. rex bones, much to Mike's surprise. The mysteries begin with cattle killings and strange engine noises at night, and soon more newcomers appear, including a retired Hollywood producer and his heavily tattooed Russian friend. Environmental activists and government land agents add to the suspect pool, and when a murder occurs at the county Fourth of July party, Mike is forced to combine his skill sets to discover the truth and protect those he cares about."

-Dan Forrest, Western Kentucky Univ. Libs., Bowling Green (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc.

THE WOLVES OF ANDOVER by Kathleen Kent

"This prequel to Kent's The Heretic's Daughter (2008) focuses on the early life of outspoken, tart-tongued Martha Allen, from whom the author is descended. Set in seventeenth-century Massachusetts, the novel finds the still-unmarried 23-year-old Martha being sent to live with her cousins as a domestic. Once there, she finds herself intrigued by a hired man named Thomas Carrier. A Welshman, he is the tallest man she has ever seen and one of the most taciturn. But when he saves her from two marauding wolves, intrigue turns to attraction. But other wolves human ones this time may pose an even greater danger to the two. Who is Thomas, in fact? What part might he have played in the overthrow and beheading of England's Charles I? And why have a clutch of dangerous assassins come from England in search of him? An example of the currently popular genre-blender, the book is part historical fiction, part romance, and part suspense. Skillfully meshing these various elements, the author's latest effort is bound to please fans of each."

--Michael Cart, Copyright 2010 Booklist

“Straight is both a novelist and a mother, and has to be numbered among the Mothers of Invention who count for so much in our literature, writers such as Louise Erdrich and Jane Smiley, Barbara Kingsolver and Dorothy Allison.”

—"The Boston Globe"

TAKE ONE CANDLE LIGHT A ROOM by Susan Straight

"Straight's (A Million Nightingales) newest heroine, FX Antoine, keeps a distance from her family, her past, and even her present. Her one tie to home is her godson Victor, the child of her murdered best friend, whose involvement in a shooting sends him careening off the college path and potentially straight into a life of crime. He flees to Louisiana, where FX grew up, and is followed by her and her father, who wrestles with family secrets of his own. Their pursuit of Victor is marred by complications, not the least of which is the looming Hurricane Katrina, putting them all at risk. Straight again places readers in a rich and alien culture, a melange of misfits and outlaws. FX is a detached protagonist, resisting her own family and culture, and readers will share her outsider's viewpoint. Straight's love of language is embedded in every page....."

~ Publisher Weekly Review, Copyright 2010 Reed Business Information.

Cleo: The Cat Who Mended a Family
by Helen Brown

I'll admit it, I'm a sucker for animal stories, especially ones about cats.

"Grace can come in deceptively small packages. For Brown, it arrived in the form of a runt-of-the-litter kitten whom her two young sons, Sam and Rob, adored on sight. Promised as an upcoming present for Sam's tenth birthday, it was a gift the boy never received. While the kitten was being weaned from its mother, Sam was taken from his. Just weeks after his birthday, Sam was killed in an auto accident, and Brown's world changed forever. Yet when the kitten was delivered to her new home right on schedule, Brown's heart first broke with the unfairness of it all, then gradually began to mend as little Cleo did what all kittens do: mounted a charm offensive like no other. Over the next 23 years, as Brown's marriage ended and career blossomed, the spunky Cleo remained her constant source of comfort and inspiration. Heartfelt and open, Brown's buoyant tale of loss and recovery celebrates the resilient patience and restorative powers of animal compassion."

~ Carol Haggas, Copyright 2010 Booklist

The Lady Matador's Hotel by Cristina Garcia

"The Hotel Miraflor is the epicenter for explosive conflict in the capital of an unnamed Central American country ravaged by civil war and corruption. During the first week in November 2003, a presidential campaign reaches fever pitch, a military conference convenes at the hotel, and battles intimate and political, ritualized and spontaneous, erupt with seismic force. The hotels most prominent guest is a veritable goddess, Suki Palacios, a lithe and fearless matador from California of Mexican and Japanese descent, a woman who brandishes her beauty like a weapon. Another indomitable woman, attorney Gertrudis, uses the hotel as headquarters for her lucrative black-market adoption operation. Won Kim, a reluctant Korean factory owner, has sequestered his pregnant teenage mistress in the honeymoon suite. Aura, an ex-guerrilla working as a waitress at the hotel, plots revenge against a murderous, weight-lifting colonel. Garcia strides and twirls with a matadors daring, grace, and focus as she enters the psyches of diverse, intense, and unnerving characters; choreographs converging and dramatic story lines; and confronts the pervasiveness of the inexplicable. Streamlined, sexy, darkly witty, and succinctly tragic, Garcias fifth sharply imagined novel of caustic social critique concentrates the horrors of oppression and violence into a compulsively readable tale of coiled fury and penetrating insight.

~Booklist, copyright 2010, American Library Association

Big Girls Don't Cry: The Election that Changed Everything for American Women by Rebecca Traister

"Superb.... Big Girls Don't Cry is much more than an assemblage of these type of 'boys on the bus' campaign anecdotes. As anyone who's followed Traister's sharp and lively essays in Salon knows, her particular 'beat' is gender. What she does here is tease out the cultural narratives that came to wield so much power during the [2008 presidential] campaign and, finally, in the voting booth.... There's so much…to be learned and argued over in Big Girls Don't Cry…. Girls, these days, can not only run for president; they can also brilliantly analyze presidential campaigns, too."—Maureen Corrigan, NPR's Fresh Air

THE EXILE: AN OUTLANDER GRAPHIC NOVEL by Diana Gabaldon (Illustrated by Hoang Nguyen)

"Diana Gabaldon’s brilliant storytelling has captivated millions of readers in her bestselling and award-winning Outlander saga. Now, in her first-ever graphic novel, Gabaldon gives readers a fresh look at the events of the original Outlander: Jamie Fraser’s side of the story, gorgeously rendered by artist Hoang Nguyen." ~ Book Jacket

The Mullah's Storm by Thomas W. Young

"At the start of Young's well-crafted first novel, a transport plane carrying a high-value prisoner, a radical mullah, is forced down in the rugged Hindu Kush of Afghanistan. Maj. Michael Parson, the plane's co-pilot, and female Master Sergeant Gold, an interpreter who speaks Pashto, must brave a ferocious winter storm and reach a nearby Special Forces team with the mullah, but they wind up in the hands of Taliban insurgents. The SF team rescues Parson, but the Taliban escape, taking the mullah and the translator in opposite directions. The team must try to recapture the mullah, but Parson can't abandon Gold because "You love your comrades more than you hate your enemies." Young (The Speed of Heat: An Airlift Wing at War in Iraq and Afghanistan) draws on his own war experiences for verisimilitude, which, along with believable characters and an exciting plot, makes this one of the better thrillers to come out of the Afghan theater."

~ Copyright 2010 Reed Business Information

Freedom: A Novel by Jonathan Franzen



"Patty and Walter Berglund were the new pioneers of old St. Paul, the gentrifiers, the hands-on parents, the avant-garde of the Whole Foods generation. Patty was the ideal sort of neighbor, who could tell you where to recycle your batteries and how to get the local cops to actually do their job. She was an enviably perfect mother and the wife of Walter's dreams. Together with Walter (environmental lawyer, commuter cyclist, total family man) she was doing her small part to build a better world. But now, in the new millennium, the Berglunds have become a mystery. Why has their teenage son moved in with the aggressively Republican family next door? Why has Walter taken a job working with Big Coal? What exactly is Richard Katz rocker and Walter's college best friend and rival still doing in the picture? Most of all, what has happened to Patty? Why has the bright star of Barrier Street become a very different kind of neighbor an implacable Fury coming unhinged before the street's attentive eyes?


In his first novel since The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen has given us an epic of contemporary love and marriage. Freedom comically and tragically captures the temptations and burdens of liberty: the thrills of teenage lust, the shaken compromises of middle age, the wages of suburban sprawl, the heavy weight of empire. In charting the mistakes and joys of Freedom's characters as they struggle to learn how to live in an ever more confusing world, Franzen has produced an indelible and deeply moving portrait of our time."

Room: A Novel by Emma Donoghue

(*Note: This novel was already written by the time the Jaycee Dugard story broke).

"Five-year-old Jack and his Ma enjoy their long days together, playing games, watching TV, and reading favorite stories. Through Jack's narration, it slowly becomes apparent that their pleasant days are shrouded by a horrifying secret. Seven years ago, his 19-year-old Ma was abducted and has since been held captive-in one small room. To her abductor she is nothing more than a sex slave, with Jack as a result, yet she finds the courage to raise her child with constant love under these most abhorrent circumstances. He is a bright child-bright enough, in fact, to help his mother successfully carry out a plan of escape. Once they get to the outside world, the sense of relief is short lived, as Jack is suddenly faced with an entirely new worldview (with things he never imagined, like other people, buildings, and even family) while his mother attempts to deal with her own psychological trauma. Verdict Gripping, riveting, and close to the bone, this story grabs you and doesn't let go."

~ Susanne Wells, P.L. of Cincinnati & Hamilton Cty. Copyright 2010 Reed Business Information.

"A 'comic book' like I have never seen before. the illustrations are beautifully drawn. the amazing details in the panels are absolutely wonderful. check it out for yourself--you will not be disappointed."

~ Jaclyn

CHARLES DARWIN'S ON THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES: A GRAPHIC ADAPTATION



"It is like confessing a murder," wrote Darwin, foreseeing that his complex work would upset millennia of theological tradition about the origins of life forms. Indeed, the creationism wars continue today. Now Rodale's lovely and multitextured version introduces a more accessible Darwin, no less complex-or fascinating. The graphic novel follows Origin's original chapters, combining snippets of Darwin's text with quotes from letters, illustrative examples from his time and from the present, and occasional invented dialog. Fuller's images of people seem clumsy, but her full-color plants, animals, charts, maps, and scientific accoutrements are attractive and effective. In drawings of three saber-toothed cats, for example, we can observe the "imperfection of the geological record" when only one animal perishes in a bog preserving the full skeleton. An afterword from Keller brings the scholarship up-to-date, from Mendel's pea plants to Wilson's sociobiology."

~ Copyright 2010 Reed Business Information.

THE PASSAGE by Justin Cronin

A human-created virus has infected humankind, mutating most into superstrong, near-immortal vampiric creatures. The "virals"-also called "jumpers" and "dracs" (after Dracula, of course)-can leap 20 feet through the air at a bound and split a human (or a horse, or a cow) in half with their bare hands. A small band of men and women embark on a cross-country trek, looking for a way to protect the few remaining uninfected humans from extinction. With them travels an enigmatic prepubescent girl who talks to the virals with her mind and seems to have been born 100 years before. VERDICT The monsters in this compulsive nail biter are the scariest in fiction since Stephen King's vampires in Salem's Lot. Although the novel runs 700 pages, Cronin is a master at building tension, and he never wastes words. Shout it from the hills! This exceptional thriller should be one of the most popular novels this year.

~ For Library Journal: David Keymer, Modesto, CA Copyright 2010 Reed Business Information

One of the best books I have ever read. Loved the characters. Very interesting story about the help in the South. ~ Lisa

Note: The Brookfield Library will be hosting a book discussion on THE HELP on Thursday, September 2nd at 12:30 and 7:00 p.m. We have a limited number of copies available at the check out desk for any reader who registers and will attend one of the discussions.


THE HELP: A NOVEL by Kathryn Stockett



"......Optimistic, uplifting debut novel (and maiden publication of Amy Einhorn's new imprint) set during the nascent civil rights movement in Jackson, Miss., where black women were trusted to raise white children but not to polish the household silver. Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan is just home from college in 1962, and, anxious to become a writer, is advised to hone her chops by writing "about what disturbs you." The budding social activist begins to collect the stories of the black women on whom the country club sets relies--and mistrusts--enlisting the help of Aibileen, a maid who's raised 17 children, and Aibileen's best friend Minny, who's found herself unemployed more than a few times after mouthing off to her white employers. The book Skeeter puts together based on their stories is scathing and shocking, bringing pride and hope to the black community, while giving Skeeter the courage to break down her personal boundaries and pursue her dreams. Assured and layered, full of heart and history...."

2008 Reed Business Information.

ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK: MY YEAR IN A WOMEN'S PRISON by Piper Kerman



A compelling, often hilarious, and unfailingly compassionate portrait of life inside a women's prison - When Piper Kerman was sent to prison for a ten-year-old crime, she barely resembled the reckless young woman she'd been when, shortly after graduating Smith College, she'd committed the misdeeds that would eventually catch up with her. Happily ensconced in a New York City apartment, with a promising career and an attentive boyfriend, she was suddenly forced to reckon with the consequences of her very brief, very careless dalliance in the world of drug trafficking.

Kerman spent thirteen months in prison, eleven of them at the infamous federal correctional facility in Danbury, Connecticut, where she met a surprising and varied community of women living under exceptional circumstances. In Orange Is the New Black, Kerman tells the story of those long months locked up in a place with its own codes of behavior and arbitrary hierarchies, where a practical joke is as common as an unprovoked fight, and where the uneasy relationship between prisoner and jailer is constantly and unpredictably recalibrated. Revealing, moving, and enraging, Orange Is the New Black offers a unique perspective on the criminal justice system, the reasons we send so many people to prison, and what happens to them when they're there. ~ Book Jacket

"Whether or not you are a dog lover, you will love this book! The characters and story are unforgettable, and I have a new appreciation for car racing. Enzo lives on!

~ Patti

THE ART OF RACING IN THE RAIN by Garth Stein

"Enzo narrates his life story, beginning with his impending death. Enzo's not afraid of dying, as he's seen a television documentary on the Mongolian belief that a good dog will reincarnate as a man. Yes, Enzo is a dog. And he belongs to Denny: husband, father, customer service technician. Denny's dream is to be a professional race-car driver, and Enzo recounts the triumphs and tragedies--medical, financial, and legal--they share in this quest, the dangers of the racetrack being the least of their obstacles. Enzo ultimately teaches Denny and the reader that persistence and joie de vivre will see them through to the checkered flag."


~Dan Forrest, Western Kentucky Univ. Libs., Bowling Green Copyright 2008 Reed Business Information.

Insignificant Others by Stephen McCauley

"...Richard Rossi, a middle-aged human resources manager, confronts several delusions about his life: that his relationship with his partner, Conrad, is strong, despite infidelity on both sides; that he isn't really in love with Benjamin, a married father of two; and that his career is going well and he likes his job. As Conrad drifts away on frequent business trips, Richard is forced to think about what might have been. Set in Boston during the last years of the Bush administration, as the economy is starting to teeter, the novel has an end-of-an-era feel that fits Richard's contemplations about love, the generation gap, compulsive fitness, and the worship of material goods...."


~ Devon Thomas, DevIndexing, Chelsea, MI for Library Journal

The Solitude of Prime Numbers by Paolo Giordano



"It's love, or something like it, for 15-year-old Alice Della Rocca when she first lays eyes on Mattia Balossino in the halls of her school. She recognizes a kindred spirit in the awkward, intelligent boy, who sports a bandage on his hand, the result of a shocking self-harming episode. Anorexic, with a bad leg from a childhood ski accident, Alice insinuates herself into Mattia's life in spite of the wall he has put up around himself, and the two settle into an odd but lasting friendship. Preferring not to be touched and feeling most at home in his math studies, Mattia comes to see both himself and Alice as"twin prime" numbers—similar, but always separated.

Eventually, after graduating from college, he reveals to Alice the awful secret behind his cutting habit. At the age of seven he left his retarded twin sister Michela in a local park to attend a birthday party, and she was never seen again. His confession brings the two closer, but soon after Mattia takes a job at a university overseas, in part to escape his feelings for Alice. Once there he flourishes in his career while carefully avoiding personal entanglements. Alice in turn settles down with an outgoing doctor she believes can give her a normal life. But the two never forget each other, and when Alice's life takes a difficult turn she summons Mattia back to Italy. He comes, knowing full well that surrendering to his attraction to her holds equal parts pain and pleasure. A bestseller in Europe, winner of the Premio Strega in the author's native Italy, this compelling debut shows a remarkable sensitivity and maturity in the depiction of its damaged soul mates." ~Kirkus Reviews

"This book is an easy summer read. Bella is a lipstick-addicted makeup artist and stylist who is divorced and has sworn away men. Then she meets Sean Ryan and things turn out a little differently. Along the way, she has many entanglements with a large, loving family. The escapades of Bella and her family, set in small town Massachusetts, make for an enjoyable story. I recommend this book for anyone looking for a fun, happy, easy read. ~Megan

Summer Blowout by Claire Cook "Cook updates the themes of love and disenchantment that drove "Lifes a Beach" and "Must Love Dogs" in her latest beacher. Bella Shaughnessy, a makeup artist whose solace in times of hardship is finding just the right lipstick to match her mood, gets a divorce and quits men after discovering that her husband of 10 years has been seeing her younger half-sister, Sophia. During a wedding job, she gets stuck with dog-sitting Precious (who looked kind of like a flying squirrel) and quickly gets so attached that she takes drastic measures to keep the dog. Can other kinds of attachment be far behind, as cute and easygoing Sean Ryan enters the picture? Sufficient comedy and romance keep readers entertained until the last page." ~Publisher Weekly

"In a day-by-day diary format, Libby Riddles tells her own story of winning the 1985 Alaskan Iditarod dog sled race. Without preamble or historical "filler," the first page jumps right into the Anchorage start of the race and takes the reader along every step of the next grueling, exhausting 18 days and 1200 miles to the finish line in Nome. Riddles shares with her readers the roller coaster of emotions that define her quest: the pain and exhaustion, the joy and hope, the fear, the incredible beauty of Alaskan wilderness, the hunger and thirst, the friendships and camaradarie, and above all, her love for her dogs."
~ Margaret

RACE ACROSS ALASKA: THE FIRST WOMAN TO WIN THE IDITAROD TELLS HER STORY by Libby Riddles and Tim Jones

Patrick Davis has it all until he's kicked off the set of the movie production of his screenplay, he's being sued by the actor for assault and he's dealing with his wife's infidelity. But as bad as things are, his real troubles start after he receives a dvd and learns that he and his wife are the victims of identity theft and some serious and deadly stalking. Watch for this on the big screen! ~ Katherine

THEY'RE WATCHING by Gregg Hurwitz

Always a master of the gripping setup, Hurwitz (Trust No One) outdoes himself in this ultra-suspenseful thriller. One gray L.A. winter morning, disgraced screenwriter Patrick Davis steps out onto his porch in Bel Air, retrieves his newspaper, and finds a DVD tucked inside. The DVD opens with a static image of Patrick's downstairs bathroom, shot from outside the house, then shows him entering, using the toilet, and leaving. Other DVDs follow, each more disturbing than the last, until Patrick receives a phone call: "So. are you ready to get started?" Readers will be more than ready, as Hurwitz sure-handedly leads everyone, Patrick included, through this tale of mystery and murder, serving up one shocking surprise after another. Patrick eventually proves that, even though he's been outmaneuvered time after time, he's not entirely the pawn those manipulating him take him for. " ~ Publisher Weekly

THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS by Rebecca Skloot

"Science journalist Skloot makes a remarkable debut with this multilayered story about "faith, science, journalism, and grace." It is also a tale of medical wonders and medical arrogance, racism, poverty and the bond that grows, sometimes painfully, between two very different women-Skloot and Deborah Lacks-sharing an obsession to learn about Deborah's mother, Henrietta, and her magical, immortal cells. Henrietta Lacks was a 31-year-old black mother of five in Baltimore when she died of cervical cancer in 1951. Without her knowledge, doctors treating her at Johns Hopkins took tissue samples from her cervix for research. They spawned the first viable, indeed miraculously productive, cell line-known as HeLa. These cells have aided in medical discoveries from the polio vaccine to AIDS treatments. What Skloot so poignantly portrays is the devastating impact Henrietta's death and the eventual importance of her cells had on her husband and children."

~ Publisher Weekly Review

Asterios Polyp by David Mazzucchelli

David Mazzucchelli's boldly ambitious, boundary-pushing graphic novel is remarkable for the way it synthesizes word and image to craft a new kind of storytelling, and for how it makes that synthesis seem so intuitive as to render it invisible…Asterios Polyp is a fast, fun read, but it's also a work that has been carefully wrought to take optimum advantage of comics' hybrid nature — it's a tale that could only be told on the knife-edge where text and art come seamlessly together.

–NPR’s The Five Best Books to Share with Your Friends.

Check this out for our summer reading program!

Charley's Web by Joy Fielding

"A newspaper columnist who pushes the limits is contacted by a young girl who was a nanny and killed the children she cared for. She is now on death row and she wants Charlotte to make her story into a book. Surprise ending!" ~ Nancy

"New author for me. Enjoyable, fast-paced political thriller. I enjoyed the characters and will definitely read more of Flynn's work. If you like Ludlum or Clancy, you'll enjoy this book." ~ Patrick

EXTREME MEASURES by Vince Flynn

"In the newest devastatingly intense thriller by #1 New York Times bestselling phenomenon Vince Flynn, his deadly and charismatic hero Mitch Rapp wages a war against a new enemy with the help of a fellow soldier as dedicated -- and as lethal -- as they come.Vince Flynn's thrillers, featuring counter terrorism operative Mitch Rapp, dominate the imagination of readers everywhere. In them, Flynn captures the secretive world of the fearless men and women, who, bound by duty, risk their lives in a covert war they must hide from even their own political leaders."

"Latest in the Lincoln Rhyme series and it didn't disappoint. Raised some interesting questions about being disabled along with the mystery/suspense story." - Marie

THE BURNING WIRE by Jeffery Deaver

"An explosion at a Manhattan electrical power substation that destroys a bus--followed by threats of much worse violence unless Algonquin Consolidated Power and Light meets virtually impossible demands-sparks Deaver's sterling ninth Lincoln Rhyme novel (after The Broken Window). Forensic expert Rhyme takes charge of looking into the fatal blast, aided by his partner and sometime lover, field agent Amelia Sachs, among others.....The twin investigations take an increasingly dangerous toll on quadriplegic Rhyme's precarious physical health. Not even the brilliant Rhyme can foresee the shocking twists the case will take in this electrically charged thriller."
~ Publisher's Weekly

THE MOUNTAIN BETWEEN US by Charles Martin


From the author of Where the River Ends, comes this page-turning story of love and survival. On a stormy winter night, two strangers wait for a flight at the Salt Lake City airport. Ashley Knox is an attractive, successful writer, who is flying East for her much anticipated wedding. Dr. Ben Payne has just wrapped up a medical conference and is also eager to get back East for a slate of surgeries he has scheduled for the following day. When the last outgoing flight is cancelled due to a broken de-icer and a forthcoming storm, Ben finds a charter plane that can take him around the storm and drop him in Denver to catch a connection. And when the pilot says the single engine prop plane can fit one more, if barely, Ben offers the seat to Ashley knowing that she needs to get back just as urgently. And then the unthinkable happens. The pilot has a heart attack mid-flight and the plane crashes into the High Uintas Wilderness-- one of the largest stretches of harsh and remote land in the United States.

Check this out for summer reading!

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest: A Novel by Stieg Larsson

Have you been caught up in the trilogy by the late Swedish author and journalist Stieg Larsson? The final book has just been released (unless there's more lurking on his laptop) and it's not to be missed. But these books must be read in order, so if you want to get immersed in some of the best storytelling around, reserve a copy of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, and lose yourself in this series that NY Times Book reviewer David Kamp calls utterly addicting and meet two of the most interesting characters on fiction pages today: "a fearless middle-aged journalist named Mikael Blomkvist, who publishes an Expo-like magazine called Millennium, and a slight, sullen, socially maladjusted, tech-savvy young goth named Lisbeth Salander, the “girl” of the books’ titles, who, in addition to her dragon tattoo, possesses extraordinary hacking abilities and a twisted, complicated past. "

Book 'Em! Our mystery discussion group at The Brookfield Library will discuss The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo on August 30.

'Water Your Mind: Read' is The Brookfield Library's Adult Summer Reading Program for 2010 for ages 17 and older.

Come join the fun this summer as The Brookfield Library helps you "Water Your Mind." Read some of your favorite books, find a new author, or read books you wouldn't normally choose. Just for signing up for adult summer reading, you'll receive a book mark and seed packet for summer growing (while supplies last).

There will be prize drawings for various activities that include:

- Reading three adult books

- Reading one book and writing a review for our blog

- Completing a library bingo game

- Submitting a photograph of you reading a book while on vacation or on a staycation

There will be a grand prize drawing for all adult (17+) participants. Water Your Mind will be held from June 15 - August 6. Registration packets will be available on Tuesday, June 21st. Prizes have been generously provided by The Friends of The Brookfield Library.